The present disclosure relates to a coordinate measuring machine, and more particularly to a portable articulated arm coordinate measuring machine having integrated software controls.
Portable articulated arm coordinate measuring machines (AACMMs) have found widespread use in the manufacturing or production of parts where there is a need to rapidly and accurately verify the dimensions of the part during various stages of the manufacturing or production (e.g., machining) of the part. Portable AACMMs represent a vast improvement over known stationary or fixed, cost-intensive and relatively difficult to use measurement installations, particularly in the amount of time it takes to perform dimensional measurements of relatively complex parts. Typically, a user of a portable AACMM simply guides a probe along the surface of the part or object to be measured. The measurement data are then recorded and provided to the user. In some cases, the data are provided to the user in visual form, for example, three-dimensional (3-D) form on a computer screen. In other cases, the data are provided to the user in numeric form, for example when measuring the diameter of a hole, the text “Diameter=1.0034” is displayed on a computer screen.
An example of a prior art portable articulated arm CMM is disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,402,582 ('582), which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. The '582 patent discloses a 3-D measuring system comprised of a manually-operated articulated arm CMM having a support base on one end and a measurement probe at the other end. Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,611,147 ('147), which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety, discloses a similar articulated arm CMM. In the '147 patent, the articulated arm CMM includes a number of features including an additional rotational axis at the probe end, thereby providing for an arm with either a two-two-two or a two-two-three axis configuration (the latter case being a seven axis arm).
Contemporary portable AACMMs require a connection to an external computer, such as a laptop, to calculate positional data from the raw measurement data collected by the AACMM. In addition, the external computer also provides a user interface application to allow the operator to give instructions to the AACMM. Thus, an AACMM is required to have a driver that supports communication with a variety of operating systems (and operating system levels). In addition, troubleshooting is often difficult because other applications, including those not related to portable AACMM functions, may also be executing on the external computer and impacting portable AACMM functions. Though current AACMMs are suitable for their intended purpose, it would be desirable to reduce the amount of variability introduced by the use of an external computer in conjunction with the portable AACMM to perform measurement functions.